


how we say hello

by rainbowfantasy



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Child Soldiers, Childhood Trauma, Experimentation on Children and Adults, Found Family, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kidnapping, Non-Graphic Child Endangerment, Non-Graphic Violence, Pseudoscience, Sephiroth really needs a nap, Warning: Hojo (Compilation of FFVII)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-15 12:01:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29683656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainbowfantasy/pseuds/rainbowfantasy
Summary: Sometimes, it’s not the big moments that change the course of destinies but the small ones. The ones that are unassuming, that feel as if they had no real consequences at all in the moment and pass by without even a hint of ceremony. Sometimes the entire fate of a planet rests in the way one person reacts to a crying child.In which Gast decides to Sephiroth with him when he leaves Shinra and sets the world on a different course.
Relationships: Aerith Gainsborough & Sephiroth, Gast Faremis/Ifalna
Comments: 11
Kudos: 37
Collections: FFVII Secret Spring





	how we say hello

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NeutrinoClover](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeutrinoClover/gifts).



> I hope that this gives you all the 'Sephiroth and Aerith' as siblings content you were hoping for.

Deep in the bowels of the Science Department of the Shinra Electric Power Company, also known as the labs by anyone unlucky enough to have first hand experience of them and live to tell the tale, there lived a small boy. 

Though he had not been born there, it had been the only home he had known in living memory. He lived in a room that was a dark grey colour with white lights on the walls and he had a chest in which he had seven books, two crayons, a change of clothes, a pair of shoes and a small electronic device which he used during his ‘educational hours’. His life was highly regulated in that way: he was brought meals three times a day, the lights would go out when he was supposed to sleep and come on when he was supposed to wake, he had exercise times where he was instructed there or moved elsewhere and at least once per day, they ran something called ‘evaluations’. He remembered that he used to be carried to evaluations but now sometimes they told him to put his shoes on and he was allowed to walk there and if he could stand without falling, back again.

The boy’s name was Sephiroth. Sephiroth knew exactly three things about himself: that he was very special, that his mother had died (which is what happened when people went away and couldn’t come back again) and that he didn’t really look like the other people. For one, they were all much bigger than him and seemed to move around without being taken places. For another, there seemed to be different types of people and he wasn’t sure how to keep track of it.

Most of his experience had been of Professor Hojo, a person he spent most of his time with and who conducted evaluations which sometimes seemed to make him very red faced and loud and other times quiet. He had learned that it was always better to do what he asked, even if he thought he couldn’t, because when he tried not to, he lost ‘privileges’ like crayons and books and his pillow. If he was really bad, he had to go to the tanks. Sometimes he went to the tanks anyway, but if he could avoid it, he did. 

Then there was Professor Gast, who went away and came back a lot. Every time he did, he would bring Sephiroth a new book, something sweet he’d never eaten before and pick him up and sit him on his knee so he could read the books to him. The books in his chest were ones that he had asked to be read so many times that Sephiroth could recite them in his head. Sometimes, he read from books that Sephiroth didn’t understand but Professor Gast promised he would when he was a little older. Sephiroth did not know how old he was, so he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to measure being old enough for that.

Professor Gast wrote books, so he was probably smart. It seemed like the kind of thing you could do if you were smart.   
Professor Gast would stay for a while, then come back, then go again and there didn’t seem like there was any way to tell when he would come back. There was a way to know when he was leaving and it was when he spent more time around him one day.

So when he was visited during his exercise time by Professor Gast and he stayed through his meal and read to him, Sephiroth already knew he was going away soon. It made him cling tightly while Professor Gast read to him, so much so he could hear his heartbeat more than he could hear his words. 

“Don’t go,” he said, twisting his fingers around the buttons on Professor Gast’s shirt and ready for whatever would happen to him for saying it. Speaking out was not okay.

“It won’t be forever,” Professor Gast pressed his mouth down into his hair briefly. “As soon as things are okay, I’ll be back.”

Sephiroth couldn’t understand what that meant, but he felt his eyes stinging and tried to control his throat so maybe no one would notice his wet cheeks. At this rate, he was going to lose his new book already and the thought made him feel shivery suddenly. The tears dropped onto his the white shirt and he tried so hard to stop before someone noticed. 

It wasn’t in time. 

Professor Gast moved away, putting him down on his bed and kneeling in front of him. “You’re going to be okay,” he said, pressing his fingers over Sephiroth’s eyes. “You’re very, very special.”

Sephiroth was special and important. He was bad because he didn’t want to be special or important. He wanted to be picked up again and read to and to be put to bed and read to till the light went out but when he tried to say it, it never came out right and now he was making noises. Crying was bad enough but loud crying was very bad. He was going to the tank and who knew when he would get to see Professor Gast again? 

Professor Gast didn’t grab his wrists the way Professor Hojo did and drag him away. He didn’t quietly tell him to follow either which always somehow felt worse. He was just looking at him with an expression Sephiroth couldn’t read and all of a sudden, he found himself being enveloped by the man and held tightly in a way that didn’t feel like the restraints in the nursery or being held down but something that made his chest feel too big for his body. 

“When the lights go out, put your shoes on and get back into bed.” Professor Gast’s voice was barely audible. “Don’t sleep.”

* * *

Sometimes, it’s not the big moments that change the course of destinies but the small ones. The ones that are unassuming, that feel as if they had no real consequences at all in the moment and pass by without even a hint of ceremony.

Sometimes the entire fate of a planet rests in the way one person reacts to a crying child. 

* * *

Sephiroth waited a long time under the covers. No lights came on, but he heard the doors open and Professor Gast hurriedly put him into some sort of puffy thing with a hood and then he did something that Sephiroth had been told never, ever to do.

The silver bangles that went around his wrists were taken off. He wasn’t supposed to do that. No one was supposed to do that. 

“Stay quiet until I say it’s okay,” Professor Gast said in that same low toned voice, then picked him and hugged him close to his chest. 

Then Professor Gast ran.

* * *

“Gast?” There’s a woman’s voice and it sounded familiar in a way he couldn't quite explain. They were on a level of the labs he’d never seen before and he wanted to look around, but Professor Gast held him tightly in place. “I thought you said -”

“I know what I said,” Professor Gast put his hand behind Sephiroth’s head, pulling him close to his chest. “We can’t leave him.”

He was going with him? Sephiroth’s heart began to pound. He was going to go to the place where the books and pictures and sweets were. They were going to leave. It was terrifying and amazing and he felt like he might throw up, but in a good way.

“Tracking?” said the voice.

“I’ll need to check for sub dermal but I don’t think they’ve ever considered anyone would get this close,” Professor Gast replied. “Contact is outside, we have to go now.”

* * *

Everything was very bright around him, like the room with the sharp things and tubes where he went during some of his evaluations.

Sephiroth huddled closer to Professor Gast as they descended many, many steps but he found himself handed over to a person with long, brown hair who’s sitting inside of something. A car, his brain supplies. He’d seen pictures of them in his transportation book. He didn’t want to leave but Gast plucked his hand from his shirt and handed him over anyway, climbing into the front seat.

“Hello,” said the woman, pulling him onto her knee and close to her chest. Much squishier than Gasts. “My name is Ifalna.”

“I am Sephiroth,” he said as clearly as he could. He knew that. He wasn’t always called that but he _knew_ that.

There was something in her face that was weird, an expression he wasn’t familiar with but she put her hand out in front of him. “It’s nice to meet you, Sephiroth.”

Sephiroth looked down at her hand, then at her and then to Gast who was in the seat in front of them. 

“You shake it to say hello,” Gast explained.

Sephiroth put his hand over hers and shook it from side to side. “Hello.”

“Hello,” she repeated, her voice different from before.

Sephiroth continued to stare at her as a noise kicked up and when he jolted, she pressed her hand against his back and held him close.

“It’s the car engine,” she said, as she rubbed her hand over his back in circles. “Nothing to be scared of.”

Then they were moving. 

Sephiroth wanted to look out the window but Ifalna kept him steady on her lap. 

“You can look when we get out of Midgar,” she said, still rubbing circles into his back. “Not too long now.”

They were leaving Midgar. Midgar was the city in which Shinra was and in which he was supposed to be. 

If they were leaving Shinra and Midgar, where were they going? 

* * *

Later, when he was curled against her squishy chest, Sephiroth could hear them talking.

“He’s not what I expected,” Ifalna said, her hand cupping his still hooded head. “The stories I heard about the Calamity. I expected - I don’t know, something else.”

“He’s just a child,” Gast replied. “A very bright, curious child, but still a child.”

“I know,” Ifalna replied, shifting her hands to pull him closer. “The planet doesn’t know what to make of him.”

“You can hear the planet again?” Gast asked.

“It’s easier the further we get from Midgar,” Ifalna replied. “What about the other children?”

“Their initial results came back mostly human,” Gast said. “That should keep them safe.”

“If it doesn’t?” Ifalna asked.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Gast replied. “We have other things to worry about right now.”

* * *

One of the things they had to worry about turned out to be his hair. They stopped somewhere with a bathroom and Ifalna put some kind of cream on his hair that meant after they were done, his hair was brown like hers. 

It was strange to look in a mirror and see himself look so…like someone else. He had never looked like someone else before.

“Do you like it?” Ifalna said, carding her fingers through his hair as he stared.

“Yes,” Sephiroth replied, without hesitation. It didn’t really make him look like him, but maybe he didn’t want to be him. 

Maybe he could just be a person now. 

* * *

Sephiroth was fascinated by the boat. Every now and then water droplets would fall and hit him on his cheek or his hair, but he didn’t care. The water moved out of the way like it was being carved and he didn’t want to miss a single second of it.

“Your little one’s first time on a boat?” came a voice from behind them. Sephiroth guessed they were talking to Ifalna who was holding his hand so he could look out at the stars, the water, the moon, all of it. The air smelled and tasted differently here. The way the wind pushed his new hair back felt amazing and he was cold but in a way he didn’t mind.

“Yes,” Ifalna said. 

“I think you have a budding sailor on your hands,” chuckled the voice, some man by the sounds of it. 

Sephiroth didn’t turn around. He wasn’t that interested in anything that wasn’t the waves right now.

“He can be whatever he wants to be,” Ifalna rubbed the back of his neck lightly. “If it’s a sailor, he can be a sailor.”

“What does a sailor do?” Sephiroth asked Ifalna later, when they went below deck for their arrival somewhere else. He had wanted to stay topside but was told it wasn’t safe. Shinra would come and try to take them back, Professor Gast had explained. Sephiroth did as he was told because if he went back, there would be no more boats,

“They sail boats all over the planet,” Ifalna said. “They carry people and things to those that need them.”

“Can I be one?” Sephiroth asked. “You told that man I could.”

“When you’re older,” Ifalna told him, smiling. “If you still want to.”

Travelling all over the planet? Watching the water and the sea creatures and the birds? The smell of the air, the sting against his cheeks and the taste of the breeze? Sephiroth couldn’t imagine getting sick of it. He couldn’t imagine wanting to do anything else.

* * *

They moved a lot. 

Sometimes on purpose, sometimes at a moment's notice. The bags were always packed and ready. There was always a plan in place. Sometimes they stayed at Inns, but sometimes they camped out and Ifalna would tell stories about where she came from.

“Long ago, something fell from the stars.” It always started that way. “It hurt the planet and the planet tried to heal. The planet heals by using the same energy Shinra is trying to take from it, so there isn’t enough for it to heal.”

“The planet is sick,” he would say, as it wasn’t a question anymore. “And Shinra takes its medicine?”

“Yes,” she would agree. “With the reactors.”

“Why?” Sephiroth asked.

“Power, usually.” Ifalna said. “The thing that came from the stars made people very sick too. It turned them into monsters and made the lands cold. It looked like people they loved - their mothers, sisters, brothers who had died, but it was a lie. The planet tried to create a weapon to stop it, but my ancestors - my mom and dad’s parents and grandparents and all the way back to years ago - were able to confine the Calamity. The thing that fell, we called it that. It was dormant, do you know what that means? It means sleeping. It means it could come back.”

“Did it?” Sephiroth asked.

“I’m not sure yet,” Ifalna said.

Then she would look at him and hold him close and say nothing at all. They would just watch the stars.

* * *

After a while, it felt as if his life before all of this had never existed. Like maybe he had dreamed it up one night. If it weren’t for his eyes, usually hidden now behind dark glasses and the way they had to keep dyeing his hair, he wouldn’t look much like he did then.

Maybe he wasn’t the same person anymore. No one seemed to treat him like he was special anymore. 

They celebrated his fourth birthday - a fact he was only told when it happened - in Cosmo Canyon around a bonfire. There was someone here the Professor knew very well, a strange man who bopped about all over the place and stared at him.

“Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?” the man said. “Hooo, the planet is not happy about this.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Ifalna promised. “The planet is stubborn, but so am I.”

* * *

Eventually, Professor Gast and Ifalna decided they needed somewhere safe to stay a while. They travelled up to the North where there was hardly any Shinra presence and for the first time in over a year, they unpacked. Ifalna helped him ‘decorate’ his room with a door he could choose to open and close by himself. They used paper and scissors and paints. Professor Gast said he was working on another book, something about everything that had happened and would show people what Shinra was doing was bad.

The people were different again. 

They asked questions about how he was, how old he was, what he liked and how he liked living there. Sephiroth liked it very much. He loved the snow. There were a few children, but in case someone noticed his eyes, he kept himself at an arm's length. He didn’t mind. Ifalna built snow pals with him and they gave one a mustache and said it was Professor Gast. He was very impressed with it.

* * *

After they had settled there for a bit, Ifalna sat down with him on his bed and braided his hair in the way he liked. He liked to run his fingers over the braid, over and over.

Then she said they had to have a Serious Conversation, which usually meant they had to leave which made no sense because they said they would be there a while and it hadn’t seemed like a while yet.

“You know what we say when people ask who we are to each other, don’t you?” Ifalna asked.

“Yes,” he said. They were his parents and they were travelling for research. In public, he had been told to use Mom and Dad when talking to them or about them if he was asked. Most of the time, they were close enough to answer for him but now and then, people would ask him directly and he knew how to answer now.

“I know I’m not really your mother,” Ifalna said. “I don’t want you to feel like I’m trying to take that away from you.”

“How would you take it away?” How could she take something he had never truly had?

“You had a mother,” Ifalna said. “I want you to feel safe saying no, so I just want you to remember that you can always say no and if we insist, we will always give you a reason.”

“No?” No to what?

“This place, this could be home for a while.” He knew that, that’s why they put up the paper decorations and unpacked the bags. “We needed a safe place, because I’m going to have a baby and I don’t want you to feel as if you’re loved any less because of that.”

Sephiroth felt his brain go blank. ”You love me?”

“Of course we do,” Ifalna opened her mouth and shut it again. “We say it every night at tuck in, don’t we?”

“I thought it was just something people said,” Sephiroth replied. “Like when something looks nice but isn’t.”

“It’s not a little lie,” Ifalna put her hand on his cheek. “We love you very much and I’m sure the baby will too. If you’re ready to be a big brother, that is.”

He dared ask the question that had been rolling around in his mind since he had begun to read books and listen to the radio for stories about people like them.

“Like a family?”

“Exactly,” Ifalna said. “We could be a family, all of us. Would you like-”

“Yes,” Sephiroth said quickly in case she wanted to take it back.

“Let me finish!” Ifalna laughed.

“Sorry,” he said. You said sorry when you did something you didn’t mean to do. There were no tanks here.

“Would you like us to be a -” Ifalna said.

“Yes!” Sephiroth stopped himself. “Sorry.”

Ifalna just chuckled, “The baby will call us Mom and Dad all the time and you can too, if you want, but you don’t have to.”

He wanted to.

They could just be people who lived there, a family like any other, like the ones in books with a mom, a dad and two children. They could play together because the baby would know about him and their...parents and everything. They could be friends for real.

It could all be real.

“Mom?” he said, experimentally.

“Yes?” she replied.

“Just testing,” he said. 

“What do you think?” Ifalna - Mom? - replied.

“More testing,” he said. “One good result isn’t enough, you have to have lots or it’s not good.”

“Oh no,.” Ifalna sighed in a drawn out, exaggerated way. “The last thing we need around here is more scientists. What happened to wanting to be a sailor?”

“I haven’t made up my mind yet,” Sephiroth decided.

Ifalna patted his cheek, “Take your time.”

* * *

On his fifth birthday, Sephiroth received a card from his sibling. This made no sense because the baby was still in Ifalna’s stomach, she let him feel the baby move around sometimes and said it was the baby’s way of saying hello. 

“Technically, I wrote it.” Ifalna confessed when he said he was confused. “But I think they’d want to wish a happy birthday if they could.”

Sephiroth kept the card up long after his birthday, just because he liked to look at it. 

* * *

Birth was terrifying. It involved a lot of moving, screaming and bodily fluids. It made him worry that maybe Ifalna would die too, like his first Mom had, but she didn’t. 

Ifalna pulled him onto the bed with him, pressing a kiss to his forehead and showing him the tiny, pink baby in her arms.

“Say hello to your baby sister,” she said.

Sephiroth moved the baby’s fist from side to side, “Hello.”

“It might be awhile before she can say it back,” Gast told him, patting his arm. 

That was okay.

Sephiroth could wait.

* * *

“Be careful with her,” Ifalna told him, as she shifted so the baby was more in his lap than in his arms. “She’s very fragile.”

The baby (Aerith if Gast had any say in the matter but it wasn’t clear if he did yet) was warm, soft and a little bit squirmy. It would be a long time before he could teach her to build snow pals or even just talk to her and get a response that wasn’t staring but this was okay too. She curled her hand and scraped her fingernails down his hand, leaving white marks for only a few seconds. Sharp but not painful.

Maybe this was how she said “Hello.” 

He said it back just in case.

* * *

  
“Aerith is different,” Gast told him one night as he wrote things that were important. He wrote lots of things and said he did it to help keep them safe. “She’ll be different from the other children.”

Sephiroth didn’t mind that much because he was different too. Maybe they could be different together, when she could hold her own head up.

* * *

“You didn’t think you were fooling anyone, did you?”

Sephiroth froze on his feet behind the door because he knew that voice. For a moment, he didn’t know what to do but he remembered Aerith in the other room and knew he had to try even if he could feel his heart beating so loudly in his throat that he felt sick from it. People in blue burst in pulling him out to the front room where there were others in blue along with Gast and Ifalna, who he realised was holding Aerith to her chest and Professor Hojo.

Professor Hojo put his fingers on Sephiroth’s chin, holding in place. “What have you done to him?” he tutted. “Only you could take the most extraordinary specimen and make it dull. No matter, it can be fixed.”

“He doesn’t need fixing,” Gast said. “I mean it, Hojo. Leave and don’t come back.”

“This doesn’t have to be unpleasant,” Professor Hojo said. “After all, I don’t want to damage the new sample.”

“You don’t want Aerith,” Ifalna said. “You want me. Please, just let the children go.”

“You have a chance to change the fate of the whole planet and you want to throw it away,” Professor Hojo said. 

Suddenly, there was movement and Gast told Ifalna to take them and try to run. Sephiroth pulled hard until he felt the man in blue hiss and ran to Ifalna, just in time for her to press his head against her stomach and tell him not to look. Her whole body flinched at the loud ch-ch-chi noise and something heavy hit the floor.

“A pathetic end to a pathetic man,” he heard Professor Hojo mutter. “Give me the boy.”

Sephiroth couldn’t see her move, but he felt her hand tighten in his hair.

“Let me make your choices clear to you,” Professor Hojo said, in a slow tone. “You will all be coming back. However, whether you get to keep your new sample or never lay eyes on her again, that depends how co-operative you are. Are you going to be difficult?”

Sephiroth understood it, even if he wasn’t sure he was supposed to. One of them was going to keep their mother and one wasn’t. He wanted to be the one to keep her, wanted it so much he felt like he might explode on the spot but Aerith was a baby and the labs were a scary place to be alone. Aerith was his sister and he could give her that.

He pushed himself away from her, as Ifalna dropped her hand in surprise. He tried to ignore the smell of blood, but he couldn’t stop himself from looking. Gast lay on the floor, his glasses half off and his eyes open, completely still as blood seeped out around him. 

Sephiroth didn’t remember what happened next, but he did remember waking in the green haze. If not for his hair, he could have convinced it was all a tank dream. 

* * *

Time passed in a way he couldn’t pinpoint anymore. There was no day or night in the lab. His new room had a glass front and guards posted at all hours. The light remained on. 

His hair was put back to its original silver. They ran lots of tests. He spent a lot of time on metal tables where he had to relearn not to move, not to make a sound unless asked and not to cry. It took a long time, or what felt like a long time, but he found he could just go away. It still hurt, but he could picture camping out under the stars, collecting firewood, holding his sister in his arms for the first time and it wasn’t so bad. 

He spent a lot of time in the tanks to ‘make up’ for the time he was gone. That made it easier to block out the sounds of the machines and escape, even if it wasn’t for real. If he tried hard enough, he could feel his mothers arms around him, hear his father working and smell the lotion on Aerith’s skin. 

It wasn’t so bad.

* * *

Time moved on. 

Sephiroth realised he could track it by cutting himself on the way back from wherever he was - operating rooms, nursery, VR, the drum - then he could use the blood to mark a place in a room for his height before it healed. 

He learned from tutors how to fight, how to hold a sword, how to kill creatures then soldiers in the VR. He spent less time in the tanks, but more with an IV. He was left alone more because he did what he was told to do and he couldn't run, there was a sub dermal tracker in the back of his neck where he couldn't remove it easily. Hojo watched him more carefully, but most of the staff just let him sit during infusions as long as he didn't wander around.

This was where he was when he heard the unmistakable sound of a sneeze in the ventilation. He would have put it down to an escaped creature but he heard the unmistakable sounds of someone saying “Uh oh.” Sephiroth looked from side to side: no assistants or doctors or professors, which he didn’t think there would be because he was barely half finished with his bag. 

“Hello?”

“There’s no one here!” came the voice from the vent.

“Then how are you replying?” Sephiroth reasoned. There was a pause. “You shouldn’t be in the vents.”

“I’m kind of lost,” came the voice. “Can you help?”

This was ridiculous. There was a disembodied voice from what sounded like a little girl in the vents, which if she had said it with the staff, there would be trouble. Had one of the staff brought their child here?

“Where are you going?” Sephiroth asked, kneeling down beside the vent and carefully trying to remove it without taking out his line.

“That’s on a need to nose basis!” came the voice.

“Where did you come from then?” Sephiroth asked, managing to quietly wrench it off. Still no sign of company.

“I was with my Mom,” the voice said. “But she goes away a lot. She said there was another kid here! Have you seen one?”

“Unless you’re referring to me, no.” It was unlikely she was. All staff had to sign non-disclosure agreements before even knowing he existed, which he knew from hearing about one being arrested and taken away by the Turks.

“How old are you?” came the voice.

“It’s unclear,” Sephiroth replied. “How old are you?”

“Mom says about four,” said the voice and he could hear shimmying movements now. She must be close. “It’s hard to tell.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “Does your mother work here?”

“I don’t know,” the voice said and sure enough, as Sephiroth sat back, a small girl popped into existence with a dusty dress and her brow hair tied up in a ribbon. “Hi!”

“Hello,” Sephiroth was momentarily stunned. In a way, he knew what she was going to say before she said it.

“I’m Aerith!” she declared proudly. 

“Aerith?” Sephiroth didn’t know what else to do but sit down on the floor, still a little sticky for reasons he wasn’t sure of but didn’t want to think about. “You’re Aerith?”

“Yep!” Aerith said. “I like your hair.”

“I’m-” Sephiroth stopped because they were going to be a family, she should know him but she was so little then. Why would she know him? It hurt deep in his chest when he realised that she may not remember the way he held her and promised to be a good older brother. A promise he was only able to keep once.

Aerith suddenly pressed her face up by his in an uncomfortably close way. 

“Sephiroth?” she asked.

Sephiroth was relieved he wasn’t wearing his blood pressure or heart monitors because his heart was in his throat, not his chest. 

“Yes,” he said. “You know me?”

In response, the girl flung herself against him so hard he at first thought he was under attack. Then he realised she was just hugging him, twisting the fabric of his shirt and laughing. 

“You’re so silly,” Aerith said. “How would I not know my big brother?”

“You don’t remember me,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

“Well, noooooo,” Aerith elongated the word, pulling back. “But Mom told me lots about you. She said she was sure we’d see each other again. She’s going to be so happy when I tell her!”

“Mom is here?” Sephiroth hadn't been sure if he hoped she was or wasn’t.

“Uh-huh,” Aerith said. “She went away but she’ll be back soon.”

The moment was interrupted by voices on an intercept. 

“You have to go,” Sephiroth said, even if he wanted nothing of the sort. 

“But I just found you,” Aerith jutted her lower lip out.

“I’m here at this time every third sleep,” Sephiroth told her. “If you can come back, just...make sure no one is here first. Go!”

Sephiroth loaded her back into the vent, still squirming every bit that she had four years ago when he had held her for the first time. He watched her go for just a moment, telling her to follow her dust trail back to where she was and got the grating back on just in time for an assistant to come in.

When he returned to his room, he made two marks for his height. This way, he knew he was nine years old when he did that.

* * *

The second time Aerith came through the grating, Sephiroth had heard her coming and removed the grating in advance. He hadn’t expected her to jump all over him again, but he didn’t mind it so much.

“Mom was kinda mad,” she said conspiratorially. “Then she was happy because she said that she missed you very much, but she didn’t want me to do it again.”

“Yet here you are,” Sephiroth gestured to her. “Despite the obvious danger.”

“Danger Schmanger!” Aerith said, as if that meant something other than a nonsensical rhyme. “She talked about you all night. She thinks about you lots and lots.”

“I think about you both lots,” Sephiroth admitted. Not as much as he once did, not because he didn’t want to, but because the memories he had were fragile and he feared the more he went over them, the more he lost them. The quality of them. How the house smelled, what jewelry Ifalna wore, how to braid his hair.

“Now you won’t have to!” Aerith declared, as if anything was ever that easy.

* * *

It wasn’t as if she showed up every time, but when Aerith did show up, she always had a story to tell. She would talk about Ifalna going and how she snuck around and in turn, she would ask Sephiroth things about the world because she didn’t remember anything about it.

“What was the house like?” she asked, sitting cross-legged on the floor with them.

“Didn’t Mom tell you?” Sephiroth asked.

“Yeah, but she’s a grown up,” Aerith replied. “Grown ups always miss the important stuff.”

Given her ability to sneak around. Sephiroth was inclined to agree. He told her about the rugs and the couches, the way the blankets felt, the paper parts he had cut up with Ifalna to decorate his room there.

“What shapes did you make?” Aerith asked.

“Stars,” Sephiroth said. “Fish.”

“Why those?” she asked. 

“I like the sea,” Sephiroth replied, his voice lowering even further because he was not supposed to like or dislike things.

“I like flowers,” Aerith said. “I draw them on the walls sometimes.”

Once Sephiroth knew to look for them, he found them in so many places. They never seemed to be washed away either, so either the staff didn’t notice, didn’t care or they liked a hint of brightness to the dark and dingy atmosphere. 

There were no drawings in the OR.

That fact was strangely comforting.

* * *

It wasn’t always easy. 

One time, she appeared around the door in the nursery where he had been sent after he had failed to remain still while his ribs were being tested for healing and he heard the monitors go wild. He had to tell her to run and not come back. He had tried to explain it to the doctor that he had begun to feel light-headed and panicked and they ran a lot more tests.

Nothing ever came of it.

Another time, she had appeared red faced and clingy, nursing her arm. He tried to ask her about it, but she said they only had time to talk about happy things so he left it be. 

* * *

“What are they doing to us?” Aerith asked softly, as he was still stained from the monster he had fought to demonstrate his progress to Shinra’s board of investors. Aerith had wrinkled her nose at the smell, but he hadn’t had a chance to change yet.

“I don’t know,” he admitted. Professor Hojo only talked about his damage per second, his healing and how he was going to be perfect.

“Is it that same thing they’re doing to Mom?” Aerith asked.

“I don’t know,” Sephiroth repeated. He thought of Ifalna, warm and happy and comfortable. “I hope not.”

* * *

They had a few close calls.

Once, Sephiroth had to pull out his line just to lift her into the room's vents and he didn’t have time to put it back in. When the assistant came in, he said he was standing because his line had come out and he was coming to find someone to put it back in.

They didn’t notice the grate because they were so busy trying not to get into trouble for ‘damaging’ him. He was a great investment of President Shinra’s. He could not be hurt without filling out a lot of paperwork first and never permanently.

Hojo was more difficult. He had managed to hide her behind a desk, but he had to get Hojo out of the room so he claimed to be feeling unwell. When Hojo came closer, he thought of Gast lying eyes open with blood seeping out and he promptly vomited on Hojo’s feet. The man immediately cursed whatever assistant had brought a virus into his lab and infected his ‘work’ then brought him to lay down for the rest of the day.

The next time Aerith showed up, she had a note from Ifalna that simply read that she loved him and that he was very brave. He tucked it away in the building stones where he could see it’s outline and remember it. 

He didn’t dare look at it again. He wasn’t allowed things anymore. He had permanently lost his privileges for being difficult when they came back, even if his memory of that was fuzzy. 

He would save it for when he needed it most.

* * *

The staff got complacent once he began training to be dispatched with SOLDIER. Hojo would still walk him up out of the labs and back, but as a rule, staff didn’t seem to care as much if he was watched constantly. The first time he had been told simply to walk back to his room, he had thought it was a test of some kind. It wasn’t.

Sephiroth began taking longer to get back to his room, ducking into other rooms and trying to normalise it taking longer to get there. There were a few strange looks, but no one said much of anything. He cursed himself for not trying before. 

Finally, on one of his longer routes, he heard Ifalna’s voice. 

It didn’t sound exactly like her, but he was older now too and sounded differently. It stood to reason she would too. 

He waited for the staff member to leave before he ducked into the room, where she looked up sharply at him. She looked different, smaller and not just because he had gotten older. There were bruises under her eyes and she was a lot paler than he remembered. For a moment, he felt his knees go wobbly and he surged forward, holding her tightly. He thought it would be better if he could see her, but his chest ached at the thought of letting go so it kind of felt worse.

“Hello,” she said in his ear.

“Hello,” he said, his voice sounding foreign to his ears.

“You’re so big,” Ifalna told him.

“You shrank,” Sephiroth said.

Ifalna laughed wetly, “You must be eleven now.” If her estimations of Aerith’s age were correct, yes. “I’m surprised you can remember me.”

The question was how she thought he could forget. 

“You told Aerith about me,” he said instead.

Ifalna nodded, “She had a right to know. Of course, this meant she went running to try and find you.”

“She did,” Sephiroth said. “I got your note.”

“I know she did,” Ifalna looked a little unsteady on her feet now. “She’s resourceful and very brave, even if I wish she didn’t have to be. I wish she could see the stars the way we did, smell real flowers, see the sky just once.”

It was strange to think he had experienced all of these things and come back here before he was as old as Aerith was now. “You tell her about it,” he said.

“So do you,” Ifalna said. “I’m glad you have each other.”

* * *

Sephiroth didn’t see her again until the day he was supposed to deploy for Wutai. 

The lab was running on a skeleton crew as the President wanted everyone to be cheering when they were filmed leaving, There was a sound that he thought sounded like a gunshot and when Ifalna appeared in the corridor running with Aerith, there was blood on her and one of the pistols some of the guards kept on their person hung loosely in her other hand.

“She cannot stay here,” Ifalna said. He didn’t know what had changed so much that she was willing to risk Aerith’s life in an attempt to get her out, but he knew it had to be bad. 

Sephiroth held out his hands, “I’m fast.”

Ifalna handed Aerith over to him, much heavier than she had been as a baby. If they were going to do this, they had to do it right now. He had a bag packed to go on a transport in the next hour. His sword was already strapped to his back. 

They ran.

* * *

“Don’t look,” Sephiroth told Aerith, moments before cutting a bloody path through the remaining staff. He didn’t know why she wasn’t supposed to look and from her squirming, she wasn’t happy about it but he remembered how Ifalna had made him look away. It meant it was important.

They made it onto the train, disappearing into the crowds coming to attend Shinra’s war party. There were so many people that he had to keep himself very aware of potential threats and keep Aerith close. That was why he hadn’t noticed the smell of blood was fresh until they made it off the train and Ifalna collapsed. At some point, she had been shot and she hadn’t said anything the whole way down. 

“Go,” she told him, as Aerith shook her head violently. Their mothers lips were pale and she was shivering. He had killed enough people now to know what death looked like.

“No!” Aerith all but screamed, clinging onto their mothers hand.

“Take care of each other,” she said, before pushing him away. “Run!”

Sephiroth wanted to stay and try to heal her, but he also understood what Ifalna was trying to do. She was trying to give Aerith her stars and sea and flowers. 

Aerith kicked at him the whole way to the edge of the city, but they made it out. 

They made it out.

* * *

Aerith’s rage went on an impressively long time. Sephiroth set up a small camp for them, as Gast had done for him, and let her scream and hit and kick until she eventually just started to cry in huge, hiccupping sobs. He put the blanket around her and settled in, ready to fight if he had to.

It took three days for the infantry to descend on them. In many ways, he was grateful. It gave him an outlet for the pain that clenched in his chest, it gave them a much needed boost of resources and whatever they hadn’t used, they could sell on. 

Food. Shelter. Weapons. Potions. Those were the priorities.

The truck may not have been necessary, but he appreciated it for helping put more distance between themselves and Midgar. They sold it on when they arrived at the boat. Aerith perked up at the ‘secret mission’ to sneak on, but it had been ridiculously easy compared to everything else. 

He bought low level materia in Costa del Sol. It would be more cost efficient than potions and he was good at leveling them up. 

* * *

The sub dermal tracker was difficult. He used ice and tried to be as careful as he could in removing Aerith’s, then tried to walk her through doing the same for him with a bathroom mirror. 

The healing materia was put to good use, but they got the job done. He didn’t bleed that much.

* * *

The further they went from Midgar, the more people seemed to want to help them. 

Sephiroth was baffled by it. Shinra painted itself as beloved, but with Aerith at the helm saying they were on their own because the company had killed their parents, people talked a lot more about how they too had lost people due to Shinra’s negligence or apathy. The smaller the town, the more welcoming people were and the more they asked them to stay.

They would stay for a week or so, then move on with thanks. Long enough for him to help with whatever needed doing but usually clearing out monsters. Aerith was good with plants and outside a town called Corel, an elderly woman taught them a few recipes for ‘growing children’. He lied when they asked him his age. The age of adulthood could be as young as fourteen in Shinra, but he was twelve. Twelve would attract attention. People took him at his word and often seemed to just give Aerith things (and sometimes him) things because they just wanted to help.

He was grateful, but confused.

Mostly grateful.

* * *

“When do I get a sword?” Aerith asked when they camped out in the forests. She was using a tree branch as pretend, but he had hushed her more than once because the forest had something in it that made the hairs on his neck stand on end. People had warned them away from it, said there were strange things in it but he and Aerith were plenty strange all on their own. He wasn’t worried about them, but he didn’t want to risk making a mess for Shinra to find.

“When you can defend yourself without one,” Sephiroth swept his foot under her, sending her sitting in a pouting heap. He would need to get her able to defend herself properly at some point, but until she handled basic hand to hand, she was more of a liability than a help.

Pretty dangerous with a branch, though.

* * *

The problem was that Sephiroth was exhausted. 

He slept for a few hours every second to fifth night, varying the pattern in case someone was watching, but he was lethargic during the day. His body screamed for real rest but he could find none knowing it was just Aerith and himself. She was more adept with materia than he expected her to be - she said Ifalna told her that this was common in their family - but he couldn’t trust that to be enough. 

There was only one place left that was standing to fight against Shinra, where there was no gain from turning them over and perhaps things they could offer in exchange.

It was over a year late, but Sephiroth finally made his way to Wutai.

* * *

“You can’t be serious,” the Wutai troop leader said. They struck a deal quickly enough when they realised what he was capable of, but for some reason, Aerith was a sticking point. “You can’t bring a child to the front line.”

“I’m not a child!” Aerith stomped childishly. “I’m nine!”

The troop leader looked to Sephiroth, who merely shrugged. “She’s a biter.”

Aerith punctuated the statement by smiling wide enough to show all her teeth and if he wasn’t mistaken, the troop leader looked a little bit terrified.

Sephiroth didn’t blame him.

* * *

The extra sleep helped some but not enough. Sephiroth couldn’t shake his lethargy, nor the sweats nor the nausea. On one particularly bad round, he came face to face with a SOLDIER Third Class who fought with one sword and kept a ridiculously wide sword at his back. 

Instead of striking, he bent over the trees to throw up his stomach contents.

“Are you alright?” said the SOLDIER.

“Fine,” Sephiroth coughed, steadying his sword. He could still fight. “Come on.”

“It’s dishonourable to fight an unarmed man,” said the SOLDIER. 

“I’m armed,” Sephiroth pointed out, before retching again.

“I think you might be sick,” the SOLDIER said. “Maybe we could do this another day when you’re feeling better.”

Sephiroth stared at him. “I thought you were a SOLDIER.”

“I am,” said the SOLDIER. “But I don’t believe in kicking someone when they’re down. It wouldn’t be a fair fight.”

“If we were in a fair fight, you would be dead already.” Sephiroth huffed, but the SOLDIER merely chuckled at him.

“Next time,” the SOLDIER promised.

* * *

Except the next time he ran into the SOLDIER, he instead asked if he was SOLDIER too. There were still aspects of his armour that were Shinra, he had been a prized weapon and it meant his armour especially had been hard to beat and he had never bothered replacing it.

“You don’t look like an AWOL SOLDIER,” the SOLDIER told him, after a brief, almost cursory clash of swords. 

“You don’t behave like an active SOLDIER,” Sephiroth told him. “You’re not trying hard enough.”

“I’m trying plenty,” the SOLDIER replied. “I’m just not trying to kill you.”

What did _that_ mean?

* * *

“So he just bops you on the sword a few times then wants to chat?” Aerith was walking along one of the balance beams they had set up, but she was distracted by his description of the SOLDIER.

Sephiroth refused to call anything ‘bopping’. “More or less.”

“Does he fight the troops?” Aerith asked.

It was a good question.

So Sephiroth, in addition to clearing out any SOLDIER camps that got too close to the outer village, strayed out further. He climbed trees and watched as the SOLDIER, often paired with a smaller, red haired SOLDIER worked through the forces at a rate that was higher than the average for SOLDIER. The SOLDIER also prefer not to use lethal force. He had openings to do so, but he never did. The giant blade never came off his back.

Sephiroth shouldn’t have been surprised when Aerith dropped onto the branch beside him, but he was. She had gotten better about being quiet and he was still struggling with rest so he was more sloppy than usual.

“Why doesn’t he use the big sword?” Aerith asked.

“It’s unclear,” Sephiroth replied.

Then he made the grave calculation of not expecting Aerith to climb down and call the SOLDIER over. For a brief few seconds, Sephiroth froze in place then jumped down. He heard the break more than felt it.

“You should have climbed down,” Aerith told him helpfully.

“We are supposed to be practicing stealth,” Sephiroth grumbled, experimenting with putting weight on it. “You just yelled over at an enemy fighter.”

“That sounded like it hurt,” came the voice of the SOLDIER behind him. “You should splint that.”

“I’m fine,” Sephiroth reached for his sword.

“How do you splint?” Aerith asked.

“If you can find a straight stick, I can show you,” the SOLDIER replied. “If your friend will let me.”

“Oh, we’re not friends,” Aerith said. “He’s my brother.”

The SOLDIER merely nodded, “Your brother then.”

This was how, for reasons Sephiroth could not understand or comprehend, he ended up getting his foot bandaged up by one of Shinra’s SOLDIERs as a way of demonstrating the act to Aerith. 

“Try it now,” the SOLDIER said, and begrudgingly, he had to admit it wasn’t as painful. 

“How come you don’t use the big sword?” Aerith asked.

The SOLDIER hesitated, “Use brings about wear and tear. I’d rather talk people down if I can.”

“That explains why you’re useless with him then,” Aerith pointed at Sephiroth. “He’s terrible at talking.”

Sephiroth mentally bemoaned the fact his glares never seemed to work on her.

* * *

Sephiroth wanted a nap. A nice long one, which most people would probably call a coma if they didn’t know how tired he was. He jolted hard when he realised the SOLDIER was back, this time he had gotten close enough to put his hand on Sephiroth’s shoulder.

“You look tired,” the SOLDIER said.

“I can still fight,” Sephiroth insisted.

“I know, I just don’t think you should have to.” Then the SOLDIER put his hand out. “I’m Angeal Hewley.”

Sephiroth looked at his hand. “What are you doing?”

“Saying hello,” the SOLDIER - Angeal Hewley replied.

“Oh,” Sephiroth just moved his hand from side to side. “Hello.”

“You’re not from Wutai,” Angeal Hewley said, staring at his hand. “You shouldn’t have to fight here.”

“I don’t have to,” Sephiroth told him. “I have to stop Shinra from getting too close.”

“They just want to bring a new, clean power source to the region,” Angeal said. Strangely, he said they, and not we. 

“Shinra are liars,” Sephiroth told him. “The planet is trying to heal and you take it’s energy so it stays sick. That’s why the flowers don’t grow.”

“They grow here,” Angeal Hewley said, after a moment.

“THey won’t if you put a reactor in,” Sephiroth replied. “My sister likes flowers. She’s going to keep her flowers if I have to kill every last trooper for it. We will not go back to Midgar.”

“Your clothes are Shinra issue,” Angeal Hewley said. “Do you mind me asking why you’re no longer with the company?” 

“Yes,” Sephiroth said. “I mind.”

Angeal Hewley stared at him, then heaved a sigh. “I won’t push, but if you want to talk about it, we can.”

“Why?” Sephiroth demanded. “Why do you want to talk and not fight?”

“I just think a lot of good could be done if people used words more than their swords,” Angeal Hewley said. “If you’re not hurting people outside the battle, you must have some concept of honour. I’m trying to respect that.”

“Shinra won’t,” Sephiroth told him. “Shinra have no honour.”

“You’re a little bit biased,” Angeal Hewley said.

“And you’re not?” Sephiroth asked.

Angeal Hewley nodded, “Okay. I see your point.”

Sephiroth waited for the next part of the sentence, but it never came.

* * *

It happened in the middle of summer. The heat in Wutai was intense and Sephiroth has felt as if he was running on fumes for over a year, maybe even two. He fell asleep out watching the camp but it was dark when he suddenly roused from sleep and ran back to the camp. It took all of twenty minutes to run back, but he was too late. 

The camp was all but destroyed and Aerith was gone.

Aerith was gone.

At first, he wondered if she fled into the forest but that wasn’t his sister. She would stay and fight. Her staff lay on the ground where there was shuffling in the dirt and tracks he didn’t recognise. He allowed himself a moment of panic, then pulled himself back together forcefully. He took his sword and stalked back towards the Shinra camp, but there was no sign of Aerith there. No sign anything had shifted beyond normal camp operations.

Sephiroth woke Angeal up at swordpoint. 

“Where is the other camp?” There had to be another for them to have taken her to.

“There isn’t one,” Angeal put both his hands up. “I’m telling the truth.”

His heart rate and expression indicated as much. “They took her,” he said.

Angeal sat up, narrowly avoiding his sword. 

“Took who?” Then recognition hit his eyes. “Your sister?”

Sephiroth nodded. “She isn’t at this camp.”

“No, we have no orders at all like that,” Angeal said. “There’s no one here that could have taken her - unless…”

“Unless what?” 

Angeal looked him over. “Are you familiar with a group called the Turks?”

Sephiroth swore creatively. He’d learned it from the Wutai troopers. 

“I have to go to Midgar,” he said, finally lowering his sword.

“Wait!” Angeal almost tripped jumping out of the cot. “We have a transport going back. It’s going to be the quickest way.”

“Why?” Sephiroth demanded. “Why do you want to help?”

“Your sister seems like a sweet kid,” Proof he didn’t know her that well if nothing else. “If I could have done something to help and I didn’t, it wouldn’t sit right with me.”

Sephiroth weighed up his options. If it was a trap, there was nothing stopping him from just killing them and taking the boat. He had wanted to sail a boat once.

“I’m noticeable," he hedged.

Angeal grinned, “How do you feel about helmets?”

* * *

“Of all the crackpot ideas you’ve had,” hissed Angeal’s red haired friend from where he sat alone with them on the bench. “This one doesn’t just take the cake. It takes the whole damned bakery!”

Sephiroth had to admit he felt a bit ridiculous in infantry blues and his hair kept tickling him, but it was working. It would get him in the building. There would be no running away this time. He would tear the building down. He would tear the whole company down. It was the only way they were going to be safe.

When he had finally told Angeal about why they were running and why he had to get back to Midgar, he had looked horrified and sworn to help. Maybe it was foolish, but he had tried only relying on himself and that had gotten Aerith in this mess.

From then, all he would need is a distraction. 

“Don’t worry,” Angeal replied. “I know someone who’s great with distractions.”

Sephiroth didn’t like the look on Angeal’s friends’ face.

* * *

Sephiroth took a moment to stare at the carnage. 

“Did he just release Bahamut on the administrative staff?” he asked. 

“Yes,” Angeal replied, as mega flare ripped through the corridor and employees scattered.

There was the sound of whooping joy below them.

“Is he sane?” Sephiroth asked.

“More than you’d think,” Angeal said, then added “But less than he thinks.”

* * *

Once they were in the labs, Sephiroth wanted to go on alone. He knew this place more than he knew his own face and he knew the places Aerith might be. It didn’t take long - she was in the second place he looked and then it was merely glass separating them.

“A touching reunion.”

Hojo. 

He came up to stand beside him so brazenly, as if Sephiroth couldn’t cut him down before he took his next breath.

“I knew you’d come back eventually,” Hojo said. “Look at you, what a mess you’ve made of yourself. You’re going to take forever to fix.”

Sephiroth forced his voice to steady, “Let her out.”

“I don’t think so,” Hojo said. “She may be the inferior subject but perhaps her children will be less of a disappointment.”

“LET HER OUT!” Sephiroth roared.

“Temper,” Hojo clucked. “You won’t hurt me. You know I’m right.”

Arrogant, piece of - 

Sephiroth turned his attention back to the glass, blinking hard when he realised Aerith wasn’t there. “What did you do to her?”

“Nothing,” Hojo said, walking up to the glass and peering in. “How curious, I wonder how-”

There was a very loud thump and Hojo went splaying onto the floor. Behind him, all 130 centimetres of his sister was holding a fire extinguisher and at that moment, she slammed it down on his head again, then again, then again.

“Aerith?” 

Aerith looked up at him.

“I think he’s dead,” Sephiroth said.

That was an understatement. A mess of blood, brain and membrane on what remained of his neck was scattered all over the floor.

“That was utterly feral,” came a voice from the direction Aerith had appeared. Angeal’s red haired friend - Genesis, that was his name, looked on not with disgust but with curiosity. “I like her already.”

“Gen,” and there was Angeal Hewley, holding if he was not mistaken, a lab card ID.

“How did you get that?” Sephiroth asked.

“Angeal has sticky fingers,” Genesis said.

“Only in the pursuit of justice,” Angeal said, looking a little pink.

“Look at that, the old bastard did have brains. There’s bits there, and there, and -” Genesis reached over to touch Sephiroth’s hair without a care. “You might want to wash your hair.”

Angeal put his hand to his face with an audible slap.  
  
It took Sephiroth a moment to put together what had happened. Angeal had to have activated the keycard at the back of the ‘specimen tank’ and let her out while he and Hojo were trading barbs. The fire extinguisher was from the wall. She was quick, and quiet and he really had been going easy on her if she could do that.

Aerith looked at him and he did his best to look reassuring.

“Hello,” Sephiroth said.

“Dork,” Aerith said, wiping her trembling hands on her dress. “How did you get here?”

“I used camouflage,” Sephiroth replied.

“They stuffed him and his ridiculous hair into an infantry uniform,” Genesis said.

Aerith brightened instantly, “Tell me there’s pictures!”

“What now?” Angeal was still looking at the mess of Hojo parts on the floor.

“There’s other people,” Aerith said. “Animals too. We should let them out, they shouldn’t be caged up here.”

They’d get them out, then clear the building. 

Hojo was gone. 

The department was gone.

Suddenly, Sephiroth felt like he could breath when he hadn’t even realised he was struggling to.

* * *

As a compromise, they let people know they could leave but know that anyone who tried to remain loyal to Shinra would pay for it with their lives. Everything would be a mess for a while. Shinra had too much of a foothold for it not to be and they had other headquarters, but none as well equipped as Midgar and they were running.

They wouldn’t get far.

It was breathing room. It was time for Aerith to shower and cry and hug him so tightly he thought she might actually have found a way to constrict him to death.

There were worse ways to go.

* * *

“I’m not sorry I did it,” Aerith said, as they went through the ghost building that four days before had been Shinra’s main phase of operations. “He said - he said that he dissected Mom and offered to show me the pictures.”

If nothing else, that alone was proof that Shinra needed to be torn down piece by piece. The story of them spread like wildfire and though SOLDIER was split into those who believed it and those who didn’t. Most who did were trying to come to terms with what Shinra really was.

“You’re coming back,” Genesis told Aerith. 

Since discovering a mutual love of materia, it had been hard to separate them and he was trying not to feel anxious letting her out of his sight. She needed to live her life, wasn’t that the point?

They were standing at the exit of Midgar, a week after the SOLDIER schism and four days after the President had fled to Junon. 

“We will,” she said, with a nod. “I need to keep kicking your ass because your summons like me better.”

Genesis gasped, “They do not!”

“You’ll be careful,” Angeal said. It was strange, he had never felt like he was missing out by not having friends, but he couldn’t deny it felt good to know someone else would check in with them. “Won’t you?”

“We’re not done yet,” Sephiroth promised.

“And you promised to show me how to make the good cookies!” Aerith called.

There was just one thing they had to do first.

* * *

The house looked almost exactly the same. 

Sephiroth couldn’t understand why Shinra had bothered to clear it up, but they had. Sephiroth had already cut through the last loyalties of Shinra left at Icicle, something that seemed to scare the villagers and others, maybe ones who knew the truth, simply nodded when they saw him or said hello. 

The only thing missing from the house was the rug their father had died on. His notes, his camera, the paper snowflakes they had made, the ribbons their mother had worn still on the dresser and his card from Aerith, faded but still there on the bed that seemed impossibly small. Too small for him to have ever fitted in it comfortably. 

“Did you draw this?” Aerith asked excitedly, finding a drawing of the boat trip he had done. He nodded. “That’s so cute!”

They talked for a long time about the house, about their routine, about her being born and about the card ‘she’ had made for him. 

They still had so much work to do, to finish it, to make sure none of it ever happened again and to help the planet heal, but it could wait. He was lying on his own bed, with his sister and if he shut his eyes, he could imagine hearing Ifalna singing to her flowers or Gast talking to his cameras. This should have been their home. This should have been where Aerith had grown up. This was the place they were going to be a family.

“But we are a family,” Aerith said firmly. “It’s a small family and it’s kind of messy but it’s ours.”

“Yes,” Sephiroth agreed. “It is."

“Besides,” Aerith declared. “We seem to have adopted some SOLDIERs too. They'll take so much looking after.”

Sephiroth felt as if he should argue they hadn’t adopted anyone, but given the way two in particular seemed to have decided they were going to stick around with them no matter what, maybe she had a point. He didn’t have the energy to argue. 

For the first time in a long time, he was somewhere safe, he was with his sister and maybe it would be okay to just rest for a while.


End file.
